Wednesday, February 25, 2009

I love the simplicity of this verse. When I'm stressed out, when I am panicked about something, like say turning in a manuscript to Zondervan for the first book I've ever written, the culmination of a lifelong dream, the content of which holds the potential to either steer people to the beauty of a God that means everything to me or push them away depending on how it's written? When I feel like that, I tend to complicate things. My anxiety is a tangled ball of twine and angst and Salt and Vinegar Pringles. I look at it and I think, I don't even know where to start with all that mess. I don't know what's going on. Why do I feel this way? This whole situation feels impossibly complex, but it’s not really.

An anxious heart weighs you down.

A kind word cheers you up.

Anxiety goes down.

Kindness goes up.

Pretty simple, and the best part of this verse is the subtle charge it gives us to distribute kind words like candy to our friends. Seriously, do hear how powerful a kind word is? Your friends have hearts that are weighing them down. They have hearts that are heavy and burdensome. And you have everything you need to cheer them up. A kind word.

This is just the comment I needed to read. I am writing it on a card to carry with me today.

You are such a nice person to take us on the journey of your book with you, and even ask our opinions about things.What you could easily have done, is keep writing on this site, using the things you like in your book, kept teaching and reaching and entertaining us, and then ZOWIE---one day published a book. None of us would have been surprised, but there might be sort of a feeling like "Wonder why he never told us he was doing that?" "Maybe he told only his closest friends," and "I wish I had known he was writing a book" and "Wow--Zondervan...guess he thinks he's all that" and "Man, he'll be way too busy for SCL now," etc.

Instead we are all a part of your book; Most of us would never have had the opportunity to know this world, or feel what it's like "behind the scenes," but you've given us that and I'm grateful.You are a very kind person, and your humility is immensely appealing.

Sadly, I am giving up blogs for Lent, and though it's Day One and I'm already cheating (because I sincerely forgot!) I did want to pass along a kind word to my favorite blogger.

In the spirit of the post, a kind word for you: your writing has already steered at least one person (me) closer to God. You should see my delicious bookmarks, half of them are entries by you that seemed to arrive at just the right time!